Saturday, December 15, 2007

A Very Frugal Christmas

This always seems to be how Christmas is at our house. Partly because I LOVE to find bargains and see how far I can make the money go. Partly because there's never enough to buy gifts for all the people I want to buy gifts for. My love language is gifts, so I love to give them as much as I love to get them. I really enjoy shopping for gifts for people - finding the perfect thing for that special person.

Well, this year there were about 10 families that I wanted to give something to at Christmas, but I was having a hard time coming up with something special that wasn't going to cost a fortune. So, one day while shopping at Hobby Lobby, I came up with the idea of painting flower pots and filling them with goodies to give out to our friends.

I know we're not the only ones in this situation. Seems like everyone I talk to has people they want to give something to at Christmas but just can't afford to. So, I thought I'd use my blog as a way to "give" something to all of you! If you ever want to copy this idea, here's your chance :)

Not including the ingredients for baking (which I was going to buy anyway), each pot cost me less than $2 to make - it was actually probably closer to $1.25-$1.50. You can't buy containers for that!

Here in the Midwest, it seems that Hobby Lobby is the best place for buying the pots. They were only $0.99 each. Then I used some red acrylic paint that I already had and painted green polka dots on them, again with acrylic paint I already had. Once that was all dry, I used glossy polyurethane (again, that I already had) and painted the outsides of the pots to make them shiny. I bought the ribbon on sale at Hobby Lobby for $1/roll and only needed part of 1 roll. Hot glued them to the top rim of the pot so that if I needed to stack the pots inside of each other for some reason, it wouldn't smash or rip the ribbon off. Finally, I found the tags at Ace Hardware next to the keys. This is probably the best deal of all! For a bundle of 10 tags, it was $0.29!!! Going to a scrapbook store to buy these would've been a lot more than that!!

So, there you go! If you get one of these pots, please don't think I'm cheap :) Just know that you were special enough for me to pull out all of my creative stops to come up with a way to show you you are loved by our family at Christmas!

Merry Christmas!

8 comments:

Lori said...

What a great idea Lara, and the pots are adorable! You really are creative. I'm totally copying your idea, thanks for the inspiration!

Judy & Marvin said...

As always, you are sooooo creative!! The pots are darling and I know who ever you give them to will enjoy them and know that they were sent in LOVE.
If I had sent a word to describe you it would have been "creative" because you can turn something old into a real treasure.
Love you,
Mom

Lisa said...

I'm copying you too! I love to bake but am not creative in how to showcase my goodies. My friend Rita, who is also very creative like you, told me about this magazine called Family Fun - I might check it out to assist in getting my creative juices going, if I have any! :)

Love ya.

KidsNParents said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Anonymous said...

Very nice!

Hope that Minnesota is great this time of year.

My image of Minnesota is one of green grass and warm weather - because I'm always there in the summer!!!

Anonymous said...

Hey we did something similar. While most people will be getting one of Jonathan's cd's, others will be getting a homemade gift. We have empty paint cans that we glued gift wrap and ribbons around and then filled them with a spiced cocoa mix.
(only a couple people are getting those) =) We were REALLY frugal this year. ha!

Melena said...

Now you know why I said you were creative! You always have the cutest ideas. I am so behind in my reading because I have been shopping, and wouldn't you know now that i am finally done, I decide to read this. There has to be someone I can give one of these too!

I hope you guys have a very Merry Christmas.

Robin said...

I loved my pot. I am so glad that you and your family moved here. I am glad that I have made a new friend. I hope you have a wonderful Christmas if I don't see you before Tuesday.